AllFreeNovel
Share Us
She scoffs. “They don’t count. I’d sooner save a raccoon from the streets and let him sleep in my bed.”
I hold her face and bring her back when she tries to turn away. I’m standing merely twenty feet from the people who might want to kill me. I know a large part of me wants to kill them. But here I stand, thinking about Libby’s bed. “Am I the raccoon, Lib? Am I the rabid animal that you take pity on?”
She leans into my hand and grins. “Guess so. Not sure how I feel about it. I’ve avoided the car thing for a decade, but now I have you in my bed, and no matter which name you choose to go by, that shit looks bad for me either way.”
“Maybe you should stop caring about what people think of you?”
“Says the guy who won’t admit his surname isn’t Griffin.”
She throws these words around so easily, when for the past twenty years, Bishop has been a dirty word in my world. Nobody has spoken to me as flippantly as she does, and not once has the thought of danger entered her mind.
In my world, I’m formidable, a dangerous animal few cross, and fewer yet live to tell the tale. But it’s like Libby didn’t get the memo. She doesn’t give a fuck that I prefer not to speak; she hasn’t even noticed. She doesn’t give a damn that my stomach drops every time she says Gunner and Bishop in the same sentence, or the hatred I feel for people I literally do not know.
She’s hit the nail on the head; I want to punish them for the crimes their father committed.
“Come on.” She twines her fingers with mine and slowly begins in the direction of the front doors. “They already know we’re here. It’s not like their receptionist didn’t already round up the troops.”
“You won’t reconsider staying out here?”
“No.” She stops at the glass front door and turns back, giving the voluptuous Dolly her back. “I was a little girl once, and I wanted to come with you. I wanted to run away and go wherever you went. I didn’t, and I spent the next two decades regretting that decision.”
“You were only nine, Lib.” I bring our joined hands up and press a kiss to her knuckles. “You didn’t have a whole lot of choice.”
“I do now.” She gives a small smile. “I make all of my own choices now, and that includes no more ground turkey in my diet.”
“Turkey is cheap, Elizabeth. Fuck! Stop being so high-maintenance.”
The door whizzes open at Libby’s back, revealing Dolly in her chaotic outfit of satiny black, leopard print heels, and bright red lipstick. “I’m gonna need you folks to get inside and put me out of my misery. I’mdyingto know what’s going on; the guys have raided the weapons cabinet, they hid grenades in the conference room, and then the dumbasses tried to tie Jessie to the bathroom heater. The boss ain’t sharing why we’ve gone into lockdown, but it happened right after the chick cop called, so I’m gonna need you to give me answers.”
“There are grenades in the boardroom?” Lib asks. “Are you serious right now?”
“Pins are still in.” Dolly pulls a lock of hair around her shoulder and studies the ends. “You have nothing to worry about. But seriously, tell me why everyone is panicking. I have the right to know why Kane was carrying away a screaming and biting Jessie.”
“The pregnant one?” I ask.
Dolly nods.
“She was screaming? Why?”
“Oh,” Dolly waves me off. “Not screaming like, ‘Help me, help me!’ But the kind like, ‘I’m going to tear your balls out through your asshole and make you eat them for dinner. Put me down before I smash you with a brick while you sleep!’ Our little Jessie ain’t a damsel. She’s got a problem with Kane never listening to her.”
“That’s enough now, Dolly.” A man in jeans and a flannel shirt steps up behind the receptionist with tight lips and dark eyes.
Eric DeWhit; former agent, retired now. Turned in his papers within hours of Kane doing the same. They were in together, and then they got out together.
“Theo Griffin.” His eyes scour me from my shoes to my hair, and with a twitch of his nose, his gaze goes to Libby and he does the same to her.
I pull her closer, almost stuffing her behind my back by the time he’s done studying her.
“Libby Tate.” He puckers his lips in thought, then pulls them in with aclick. “Is this official business, or are we pals?”
Libby steps out from my shield and stops only when I wrap my arm over her shoulder and force her to. Her knees almost buckle from my weight, but I’m not letting her go, and I sure as hell am not letting her stand in front of me. “I’m not here in an official capacity, Cap. I have someone here who’d like a meet with the guys. I’m kinda the…” She considers her words, then shrugs. “The middle man, I guess. I know both parties, so I made the connect.”
“You unarmed?”
He’s asking me, I’m certain, but it’s Libby who shakes her head. “I’m a cop. I’m never unarmed.”
He thinks about it for a moment. Studies her battered face, and the arm that I have slung around her neck to the point of almost choking her. Then he looks to me. “You?”
